Hackers Successfully Port Cortana To Android

There are several voice assistants on the market, but for the most part, you only have one real choice on every platform. For iOS, it’s of course Siri. On Android, it’s Google Now. On Windows Phone, we have Cortana. All three have pros and cons but many have found Cortana to be their favorite. Unfortunately, it’s confined to the Windows Phone platform for the time being. Microsoft is bringing the assistant to PCs with Windows 10 and rumors have mentioned that Microsoft could be planning to bring Cortana to iOS and Android as well. However those rumors didn’t stop a team of hackers under the name “OrangeSec” in bringing a port of Cortana to Android.

OrangeSec unveiled their project at DroidCon 2015 which they’ve nicknamed “Portaña”, a clever twist on the original name.

Portaña works using a very complicated combonation of hardware proxies, custom SSL certificates, and DNS spoofing. They fully admit that the project doesn’t look great and has some serious limitations (including only working in Italian). Portaña must be online while in use due to the fact that it has to communicate with Microsoft’s back-end servers in order to work. Controlling hardware functions like WiFi, Bluetooth and more are also out of the question.

They mention that the project is really just a proof of concept and there is very little chance that there will be an official release. The goal was to show what’s possible with a little work and not to create a competitor to other voice assistants on Android. They do hope however that Microsoft will end up releasing Cortana for Android and iOS officially.

What do you think? Do you wish you could use Cortana on your Android device or are your content with Google Now and other assistants? Let us know your thoughts down in the comments below!

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